Tesco director who led boardroom overhaul quits supermarket

Tesco is continuing to overhaul its boardroom with Patrick Cescau, who was the director closely involved in the replacement of the supermarket’s chief executive and chairman, becoming the latest to leave.

Cescau led the search for a new chairman to replace Sir Richard Broadbent and was also involved in the decision in July to oust Philip Clarke as chief executive as the supermarket’s financial performance deteriorated. Clarke was replaced in September by Dave Lewis, who was hired from Unilever where Cescau was chief executive from 2005 to 2009.

As the board’s senior independent director Cescau was the contact point for shareholders who had lost faith in Tesco’s chief executive and chairman, andwill leave on 7 April.

Cescau’s decision to leave is the latest boardroom change at Tesco after Britain’s biggest retailer suffered multiple profit warnings and an accounting scandal that involved overstating expected profits by £263m.

Non-executive directors Gareth Bullock, Jacqueline Tammenoms Bakker and Liv Garfield have all announced their resignations in recent weeks.

After helping to engineer the replacement of his fellow Tesco directors, Cescau’s departure was widely expected. Richard Cousins, the chairman of caterer Compass who joined Tesco’s board in October, will replace Cescau as the senior independent director.

John Allan, who replaced Broadbent as chairman last month, said: “On behalf of the board, I would like to take this opportunity to thank Patrick for his immense contribution to the business over the past six years, and I wish him well in his future ventures. We will be sorry to see him leave.”